Palm Pre 2 Smartphone Announced With HP WebOS 2.0

The Palm smartphone
still lives! It's alive and well! Today, Palm (or HP really) introduced
their first smartphone
since Palm was acquired by HP. It's the Palm Pre 2, and users of the
original Pre will not be surprised at the design. For the most part, the
Pre 2 looks the same as the first Pre, but with a slimmer body. It
still has a 3.1" HVGA multi-touch display and a slide-out QWERTY
keyboard, but at least the insides have been tuned up.

The Pre 2 will ship with a 1GHz CPU, 16GB of storage, a micro-USB 2.0
port, Bluetooth 2.1, 802.11b/g Wi-Fi, GPS, an accelerometer, 3.5mm
headphone jack and a 5MP camera (capable of video recording). So, that's
the hardware. The other big news today from Palm is over on the
software side: the company is officially revealing webOS 2.0, which is a
rather large overhaul of the original webOS system.

This new version has true multitasking, support for Flash Player 10.1
Beta, Skype Mobile, Quickoffice, a new launcher, support for Bluetooth
keyboards and a host of new developer features. No pricing information
has been announced, but the phone will ship to SFR in France this Friday
and Verizon Wireless in the U.S. later in the year. Canada will also be
getting the phone in the coming months.

Is this enough to revive Palm again? A revised Pre? There's an awful lot
of competition in the smartphone space, but if the new OS proves to be
slick enough, this might just be what the doctor ordered…particularly if
the pricing is right.

HP Introduces webOS 2.0, the Next Generation of Mobile
Innovation

Coming first on new Palm Pre 2 in France, the United States and Canada
PALO ALTO, Calif., Oct. 19, 2010

HP today announced HP webOS 2.0, the most significant update to the
platform since its launch in 2009 and a substantial step in HP's vision
to transform how people think, feel and connect.

The first device to run webOS 2.0, HP's new Palm Pre 2 smartphone, will
be available Friday in France from SFR and is scheduled to be available
in the coming months in the United States from Verizon Wireless and in
Canada.

"With webOS 2.0, we're advancing the innovations we introduced 16 months
ago, expanding the features that make webOS great for consumers,
enterprises and developers," said Jon Rubinstein, senior vice president
and general manager, Palm Global Business Unit, HP. "We've made
tremendous strides since the platform launched, and now we're taking our
biggest leap forward with powerful new features that make it easier to
get more things done with your webOS device."

webOS 2.0 offers consumers compelling application experiences not
available on any other platform, while providing developers an
unparalleled level of openness to integrate their applications and
services. The next generation of webOS makes it easier to get more done:

* True Multitasking – Pause a game, tap an email notification, check
your calendar, read a restaurant review, send an email reply, then
switch back to the game without closing anything.(1,2) webOS lets you
easily manage multiple open applications and notifications using natural
touch gestures. New in webOS 2.0, Stacks logically groups together your
open apps so they work the way you do. Whether you're reading email or
planning a night on the town, Stacks keeps related items together so
managing multiple tasks is even easier.
* Just Type – Start an email, create a message, update your status,
search your favorite websites – all before you've even opened an app.(1)
With webOS 2.0, whenever you want to do something on your phone –
whether it's emailing, texting, searching or almost anything – just
type. And Just Type is open to developers, so they can integrate with
the search function and add their own user-customizable shortcuts,
called Quick Actions.
* HP Synergy – webOS was the first mobile OS to connect you seamlessly
to multiple web services. With the Synergy feature, you just have to
sign in to your Facebook, Google, Microsoft® Exchange, LinkedIn and
Yahoo! accounts and your information automatically populates your
phone.(3) webOS 2.0 will extend the support for Synergy so developers
can easily plug new Messaging, Contacts and Calendar application sources
directly into the core webOS experiences.(4)
* Exhibition – A new way to use your webOS phone, Exhibition lets you
run apps designed specifically for the Palm Touchstone Charging Dock,
turning charge time into useful time.(4,5) Set your phone on the dock
and Exhibition launches automatically, showing you anything from today's
agenda to a slideshow of your Facebook photos. Exhibition will enable
developers to display aspects of their existing app experience or create
specialized apps for use when users have their webOS device in charge
mode on the charging dock.
* Adobe® Flash Player 10.1 Beta – With version 2.0, webOS now supports a
beta of Adobe Flash Player 10.1 in the browser, which provides access
to rich, Flash-based web content.(6)

webOS 2.0 also includes many more new features, including the following:

* Favorites – With webOS 2.0, you can tag your favorite contacts so they
appear as favorites in Phone and Contacts views. When you search for
them by name, they instantly show up at the top of the Contacts, Email,
Messaging and Phone apps. Favorites make it simple to get in touch fast.
* Skype Mobile™ (Verizon Wireless only) – For Verizon Wireless
customers, webOS 2.0 supports Skype-to-Skype calls and messaging while
in the United States to anywhere in the world, and low-rate calls to
international landlines and cell phones.
* Text Assist – webOS 2.0 offers greatly expanded capabilities to spell
check, auto correct, set up macros and customize the dictionary.
* Quickoffice Connect Mobile Suite – An all-new document viewer from the
leading provider of mobile document viewers offers support for
Microsoft Office Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents and provides
integration with a variety of services, including Google Docs and
Dropbox.
* Facebook 2.0 – Available via the Palm App Catalog, Facebook 2.0 will
support Facebook IM via Synergy in the Messaging application,(4) as well
as Stacks, status updates via Quick Action and the Exhibition feature.
* Browser – The browser adds support for more HTML5 features, including
geolocation support. OpenSearch plug-in support makes it easy to add
your favorite websites to Just Type web search.
* Messaging – The unified Messaging app in webOS 2.0 adds Yahoo! IM and
buddy management. Customers can now connect to their buddies through
SMS, MMS, Google Talk, AIM and Yahoo! IM.
* VPN – webOS 2.0 supports the most popular ways to connect to a
corporate network, including IPsec and Cisco AnyConnect mobile-optimized
VPN, which supports SSL (TLS and DTLS).
* App Catalog – The redesigned Palm App Catalog makes finding and
discovering great apps even easier.(7) And the new Software Manager
helps you keep your apps up-to-date.
* Launcher – A redesigned app launcher lets you add, label and reorder
launcher pages.
* Phone – The webOS 2.0 Phone app lets you easily dial your favorites
and offers reverse area code lookup and Skype Mobile integration (Skype
Mobile for Verizon Wireless only). Accounts – The new Accounts app
provides a single place to manage all your Synergy accounts.
* Bluetooth® keyboards – webOS now supports Bluetooth keyboards and
Bluetooth SPP peripherals, enabling applications such as barcode readers
and realty lock boxes.
* A host of developer features – In addition to Exhibition, Just Type
and Synergy APIs, webOS 2.0 adds Node.JS, enabling developers to create
services in JavaScript. They also can now use the webOS Plug-In
Development Kit (PDK) to combine C/C++ with web technologies in a single
app.

More information about the features of webOS 2.0 is available at
www.palm.com/softwareupdate.

Introducing Palm Pre 2

HP also introduced the Palm Pre 2 smartphone, the latest evolution to
the Palm Pre lineup. Pre 2 is the first Palm phone with a gigahertz
processor and features a 5-megapixel camera, a glass screen and a
sleeker, streamlined design that still gives users the ideal combination
of a vivid touchscreen and a slide-out keyboard.

More information about Palm Pre 2, including features and
specifications, is available at www.palm.com/Pre2.

Availability

Palm Pre 2 featuring webOS 2.0 will be available Friday in France from
SFR and is scheduled to be available in the coming months in the United
States from Verizon Wireless and in Canada. The webOS 2.0 update will be
delivered to existing customers in the coming months, with exact timing
to be announced at a later date.

Developers will be able to purchase unlocked UMTS versions of Pre 2 in
the United States to use as a canvas to build the next generation of
webOS applications and services. More information about the purchase
program will be available at http://developer.palm.com/devdevices.html.